A Distinct Taste of Desire
by ForbiddenTreasures
Summary: The one thing that was dominant in the very heart of his aura was the strong insurgent feeling of…desire. Desire seemed to pulse uncontrollably within him and seep out to everything he touched. And she was obsessed with it.


A Distinct Taste of Desire

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"You can always trust the information given to you by people who are **crazy**; they have an access to truth not available through regular channels" --- Sheila Ballantyne

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Luna Lovegood was completely obsessed. She was loath to admit that she had let pure curiosity drive her to this point—drive her to insanity. Sure, many people had considered her insane ages past, but this was the first time Luna could honestly say she believed that she was nuts.

After all, she _was_ stalking him.

She peered over the edge of her magazine, examining him as he read a book. His legs were propped up on the table and his golden eyes were lidded heavily. Deep down, she couldn't really believe he had her so interested, so _intrigued_.

Luna had always watched people. She'd made a hobby of it ever since she was young. There was something intricately astonishing about the actions of other people. Everyone always thought no one was watching and no one mattered but themselves alone; and because of this pathetically small-minded state of mind, most people's decisions were quite petty. Over time, she began to notice something: people were easy to read and who they _really_ were, wasn't all that interesting. Mostly, everyone's aura revolved around boorish pettiness. Sure, each singular person had separate quirks and traits, but it was as if she was reading the same story over and over each time she watched a person.

Well, everyone except him. He was different. There was something so enticing and intoxicating about his very person. Luna didn't even talk to him but she felt giddy and drunk from euphoria that radiated off of him like magic. He was so different that is was dragging her in.

So she would watch him, trying to figure out what it was bout him that was to unbearably fascinating. The one thing that was dominant in the very heart of his aura was the strong insurgent feeling of…_desire_. Desire seemed to pulse uncontrollably within him and seep out to everything he touched. He was looking for something entirely dictated by his desire. He was looking around and picking up everything, be it person or object that he wanted. But he always dropped it almost immediately. It was as if he'd made a mistake and that thing he was pursuing with such reckless desire was still out there waiting for him.

There was something almost wickedly delicious about the whole thing.

Everything she noted about him fit the description going around Hogwarts. The girls called him a cold, ruthless, womanizer. They said he didn't care about another person's feelings and was a complete enigma. No one really knew anything relevant about _who_ he was; they just knew he was a womanizer who could be as charming as he was rude. All this made Luna want to know more. It filled her with a restless craving to know what he was about – what was truly brimming under the dark surface that made him so mysterious and deliciously entrancing.

Luna'd been watching him over the course of five months and had assimilated a number of meaningless facts about _him_.

About the illustrious Blaise Zabini.

He was a calculating individual and very rarely showed any negative emotion. The one negative emotion that he did show was annoyance: when he was annoyed his eyes slanted dangerously and his lips thinned. He kept his distance from most of his fellow Slytherins, as if those people were bad to associate with. He treated people like objects and acted like he was a demi-god. He _never_ ate breakfast and strangely enough loved broccoli. He was the best procrastinator she'd ever seen and was incredibly manipulative. But perhaps her most interesting observation of all was that, when he saw something that took hold of his desire, his golden eyes darkened and a look of pure unadulterated rapture passed through his features, followed by a small wolfish smile.

All of the little details and facts she gathered about him gave her no inclinations that she should continue studying him, he wasn't worthy of scientific study, but she did. She studied him extensively. She hadn't even _tasted_ the desire that burned in his soul and she was already obsessed with it.

Luna Lovegood was playing with fire and she was dying to get burned.

A small sigh escaped her mouth as Blaise Zabini licked his lips slowly. She immediately cast her eyes down to the magazine before her as he lifted his head from his book and looked at her.

Luna had never been the kind to blush; such distasteful things were usually left to Ginny Weasley or tittering girls like Lavender Brown, but she couldn't help the blush that crept up her cheeks at that very moment.

Somewhere along the way Luna had stopped watching Blaise for scientific inquiry and started watching him as one of those love-struck floozies Luna so despised.

She'd had crushes before, but they were nothing like what she felt for him. When she thought about it, she supposed the reason she fancied him had much to do with the fact that they'd never spoken to each other. He'd never said that he thought she was imagining things, or that she was daft or even a loon. Because he'd never said anything to her, nothing could shatter the visage she'd made up of him.

Luna could feel his eyes scrutinizing her with curiosity. She stared at the pages before her, not daring to look back up at him any time soon. After a few minutes, Luna realized that the magazine was upside down. She was about to turn it right-side up when she decided to try reading it upside down.

This new endeavor lasted only about two minutes and then her large bulbous eyes drifted past the edge of the page to watch him once more. He was biting his bottom lip as was his custom when he was contemplating something.

Luna brushed the hair out of her eyes and tired to return her attention to the magazine. She was going insane and all because of some inane dark-skinned Slytherin with mussed up black hair.

It's not like Blaise Zabini needed another girl fawning all over him, he had plenty girls doing that already. Luna wanted to rant just a little bit; it was far too late for her to repent. She was already drawn in. Luna closed her eyes and tried to think of something other than him.

"I'm curious," a soft husky voice murmured in her ear, "Why _do_ you watch me so?"

The chair beside her was pulled out and Blaise Zabini sat down, his golden eyes scrutinizing her with great interest.

"Watching you?" Luna asked softly deciding to play dumb.

"Yes, watching me. You've been doing it for quite some time now." He inclined his head, his eyes never leaving her, "Why?"

Luna blinked, "Why not?"

He smiled and tipped back in his chair, "Why not, indeed." He watched her with a look temptation, "So, I'm supposed to assume that you've just been watching me for the hell of it?"

"You can assume what you want to assume."

He leaned closer to her, "But what would the truth be?"

Luna blushed slightly, "Desire."

Blaise raised an eyebrow, "Desire?"

"I'm…well, I think I'm obsessed with the desire that surrounds you. You have such a strong resurgent desire pulsing through your very soul…It's…interesting."

"So…you watch me because you're interested in my…_soul_? That's new."

Luna blinked, "Yes. You're different and unique. So unlike all the morons that inhabit this school. I find you interesting because you're not the same. Because you have this restless desire that everyone else fears to have. I've always hated conformity and you don't seem to have any of it."

His eyes darkened to the color of molten honey and his face exhibited complete rapture. Blaise Zabini smiled slowly. "I don't believe we were properly introduced, I'm Blaise Zabini."

"I know," she muttered, confused at his expression, "I'm Luna Lovegood."

"Luna Lovegood," he repeated. "Pleasure, to finally have a conversation with you."

Luna blinked, the realization that she was talking to the object of her affection coming to fruition. "I – I have to go." Luna breathed quickly and practically ran out of the library almost knocking into a bookcase.

She fancied the idea of Blaise Zabini and she was quite sure that if she kept talking to him, that idea would wholly shatter and she would fancy him no more. As much as she loved the idea of ridding such a useless emotion from her body, there was something terribly cruel about destroying the hopes of such a tender sentiment. She didn't really want her silly infatuation with him to disappear; she just wished those sentiments were a bit more logical. It would be so wretched to tear down something so fragile.

Luna stopped at the foot of the stairs leading to her common room and collapsed onto the floor quite ungracefully. "What is wrong with me?" she called uselessly into the air above her.

"Well," a slow voice responded, "I'm just stabbing in the dark here, but perhaps it's that you're lying on the floor?"

Luna sat up and stared at the speaker, the golden-eyed boy of her affection, "Are you making fun of me?"

He cocked his head, "Not really. You know, perhaps what's wrong with you is that you ran out on a guy who was interested in talking to you?"

Luna stood up angrily, "Look, I don't care if you think I'm weird, or a little loony, but I hate when people make fun of me and try to play on my emotions. It's mean and it's—"

Blaise covered her mouth with his hand, "Luna, I'm not making fun of you, or playing on your emotions. I swear it." His voice softened, "I really am interested in you." His eyes were still the color of dark honey.

She moved his hand from her mouth and stared at him inquisitively. "Liar," she accused.

His eyes slanted a bit, "You know, you're quite annoying me. I also don't really care what people tend to call me: cruel, a womanizer, vindictive…" He waved his hand in the air, "It's all relative to me. But I do so _despise_ when people call me a liar. Especially when I'm not lying.

You said you were watching me because I was different. Because I was filled with desire and searching for something. I _have_ been searching for something – something different that doesn't spout the same lame story as everyone else," He took a step closer to her, the energy from him tingling and bouncing onto her, "I think I've found it."

Luna harrumphed and sat down on the floor, "How is that declaration reliable? You have a restless soul that while I don't doubt _is_ searching for something, I'm also quite sure that what you're searing for doesn't exist. You'll never find it. I think you're glorifying the thing you're searching for." Luna looked up at him, "If by some twisted chance of fate, I'm what you're looking for at this given moment, that's all it is – a moment. I'll soon be tossed aside like every other person and object you've picked up along the way. That's why I say you're lying. Not because I think you're aware of the fact that you're lying. Frankly I think you're lying unconsciously."

"You're incredibly smart, did you know?" He smiled genuinely, "Well, I'm almost quite positive I'm not lying, you see, everything I've," he paused, "'picked up' before was only a passing whim. When I was picking them up, I knew they weren't right, but I figured there was no harm in trying." He kneeled before her and looked at her with a mixture of confusion and adoration, "To tell you the truth, I think I've been under-glorifying what I've been looking for and searching for it in all the wrong places." He brushed the hair out of her face, "Would you mind horribly if I kissed you? Frankly, I'll kiss you no matter what you tell me, but I'd like to know if the kiss will be reciprocated before going in."

Luna blinked, "Okay, I mean, you're driving me nuts with everything I've seen and everything you're saying to me now and I just can't take it anymore. I really, _really_ want to kiss you and even though deep down I _know_ that I'm having irrational feelings and probably under the spell of some creature, I feel like giving into the stupid sensation anyway. I'm going crazy and the way I see it, either this kiss will cure it or I'll be even crazier. It's a lose-lose situation either way."

"Why lose-lose? Wouldn't curing you of your insanity be a good thing?"

"Simple. On the one hand if I become even barmier, my soul will be begging for more kisses and stolen bits of conversation and that's just…it's bloody annoying after awhile. And on the other hand…I'll be sane. There's something dreadfully awful about losing your insanity. You see all kinds of things when you're crazy. Sanity calms, but madness is more interesting."

Blaise grinned, "Let hope for more insanity then." He pressed his lips unto hers. Luna's hand trailed to behind his neck and she pressed closer to him. There was an incontrollable urge over-taking her body telling her to eradicate all the oxygen between the two of them. His tongue traveled across her mouth and she felt like the floor had melted beneath her. She started to pull away slowly wondering if they'd been kissing for so long that she might've suffocated and could officially be considered dead. It wouldn't be a terrible way to go. He bit her lip gently before their lips parted.

His golden eyes were so dark they were almost the color of chocolate. She'd never seen his eyes go that color and she'd watched him kiss thousands of girls before.

"Wow," Luna whispered.

"Wow, indeed." He said breathlessly. "So, what's the damage?" He asked with a small smile. "Crazier or perfectly sane?"

"Definitely crazier," She muttered.

"Maybe we should try again?" He asked the smile still evident and his eyes still dark.

This was absolutely barmy. Girls like her did not go kissing Blaise Zabini after hours at the foot of the stairs. It's not like it particularly meant anything. She was probably just a way to ease his boredom at night. Even though, that kiss was sinfully good she did not want to be that kind of girl. She heard the stories that those girls talked of and…Luna Lovegood wasn't like that. She would _never_ let herself be that. "I – I should be getting to my dormitory." Luna made to stand but Blaise grabbed her wrist and pulled her back down to the floor.

"I'm not letting you go until you agree to go on a date with me this Friday for the Hogsmeade trip."

"You – You want to go on a date…with _me_?"

"Yes, I told you, you were what I was searching for."

"Were people will see us?"

"Yes."

Luna just didn't quite understand what was going on. If he didn't want her to be one ot those midnight girls that what did he want? Surely he didn't want to actually be with her. That was…nuts. "You realize that people will look at you and me and say you're a mad hatter."

"I've never really cared what people think. But I do think I'll care if you turn me down. Not that I will take 'no' for answer."

"You're a bit batty aren't you? I hadn't figured that."

He laughed, "I suppose I am. So, will you go on a date with me?"

Luna smiled, "Okay." Then as an afterthought she added, "But I still think you're slightly mad. You should see a doctor. Or maybe stop drinking. Do you even drink?"

"No, I don't drink. And I like being batty. You see all kinds of things when you're on the edge." Blaise pulled her close and kissed her again, "Don't forget," He breathed softly onto her lips, "Friday." Luna stood up and headed up the stairs touching her swollen lips tentatively. So, maybe she was just a little loony, but he was really loony. It was a perfect fit.

There was no way Luna was going to rid herself of her rather large obsession with Blaise Zabini now. She was trapped, and it didn't feel all too bad. Luna Lovegood had tasted Blaise Zabini and she'd loved it. She'd had the distinct taste of desire on the very tip of her tongue and she just couldn't wait for more.

Friday couldn't get here soon enough.

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**A/N:** It's just something short that wouldn't leave me alone. "Sanity calms but madness is more interesting" is a quote by John Russel. Thanks for reading. 

Harry Potter belongs to JKR.


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